Booking mug of former Orange County executive and current Santa Ana city councilman Carlos Bustamante, who was arrested Monday, July 2, 2012.

Orange County District Attorney Tony Rackauckas discusses charges against Santa Ana City Councilman and former administration manager for Orange County Public Works Carlos Bustamante at a press conference on Tuesday morning in Santa Ana.

Former Orange County executive and current Santa Ana city councilman Carlos Bustamante was arrested Monday, July 2.

Carlos Bustamante at his Santa Ana City Council office in 2007.

Councilman Carlos Bustamante listens to public comments during the Santa Ana City Council meeting in 2011.

Santa Ana City Council member Carlos Bustamante addresses the media during a 2008 press conference to show the results of a three-day sweep in Santa Ana aimed at curbing illegal gang activity.

Orange County District Attorney Tony Rackauckas answers a question as he discusses charges against Santa Ana City Councilman and former administration manager for Orange County Public Works Carlos Bustamante at a press conference on Tuesday morning in Santa Ana.

Orange County District Attorney Tony Rackauckas discusses charges against Santa Ana City Councilman and former administration manager for Orange County Public Works Carlos Bustamante at a press conference on Tuesday morning in Santa Ana.

Councilman Carlos Bustamante listens to public comments during the Santa Ana City Council meeting in 2011.

Former Orange County executive and current Santa Ana city councilman Carlos Bustamante was arrested Monday, July 2.

Orange County District Attorney Tony Rackauckas holds a press conference on Tuesday morning in Santa Ana to discuss charges against Santa Ana City Councilman and former administration manager for Orange County Public Works Carlos Bustamante.

Former Orange County executive and current Santa Ana city councilman Carlos Bustamante was arrested Monday, July 2.

SANTA ANA – A former executive with the county government and current Santa Ana councilman lured female employees who reported to him into his office, where he groped them and exposed himself, District Attorney Tony Rackauckas said at a news conference Tuesday.

The women feared Carlos Bustamante, 47, thinking if they reported the sexual assaults, their careers with the county would end, the county’s top prosecutor said while revealing in some detail how, when and where the alleged incidents occurred.

“This case exemplifies an unacceptable abuse of power, abuse of position, abuse of women, and abuse of trust,” Rackauckas said.

Prosecutors are charging Bustamante with crimes against seven women. They said they cannot charge Bustamante with allegations involving 12 other women — some of them from his employment prior to his county tenure that began in 2000 — because the statute of limitations has expired.

Bustamante, a married father and one-time rising county Republican star, was put on paid administrative leave Sept. 12 after the county received an anonymous letter detailing allegations of a sexual nature against him.

The letter triggered an internal investigation against him, culminating in the county counsel’s office forwarding a report regarding allegations of sexual misconduct to the District Attorney’s Office in March.

Bustamante resigned from his post as director of administrative services for O.C. Public Works in October. He posted $100,000 bail late Monday night after being arrested and charged by D.A.’s investigators in the afternoon.

Bustamante didn’t immediately respond to two calls and an email seeking comment. He has denied allegations of sexual misconduct in his county job.

Santa Ana Councilman Sal Tinajero said Bustamante should resign from the council, where he has served since 2004. “I don’t think he is in the right state of mind to serve as a representative of the people, and I don’t think it’s safe for women employees of the city to have him working within the city building at this time,” Tinajero said.

Tinajero said he has asked council staff if they’d had any similar problems with Bustamante, and was told they had not.

Councilman Vincent F. Sarmiento noted that the council lacks the authority to remove Bustamante, but said he hopes that his colleague will consider resigning.

“I certainly hope Carlos will reflect on matters before him,” Sarmiento said, “and realize that his best decision is to focus on his family, and to focus on addressing the charges.”

D.A.’s investigators interviewed 50 witnesses, many of them reluctant to speak, Rackauckas said. Their reluctance stemmed from feeling Bustamante was powerful and well connected, prosecutors said.

“He kept talking about how he was in law enforcement … you know he had a baton in his office and he pulled it out,” said one victim, according to the D.A., while another noted: “He … just seem(ed) like he was so completely untouchable … he had Arnold Schwarzenegger at his house.”

The crimes with which Bustamante is charged occurred over an eight-year span starting in 2003 in Bustamante’s executive office, where he lured the victims on the pretense of work-related matters, as well as in stairwells and elevators, the victims’ own cubicles, and in cars parked at random lots, structures or other remote areas where the defendant would drive them, prosecutors said.

Once inside the office, which many of the victims believed was soundproofed so no one would hear if they screamed, Bustamante closed the door behind them, the D.A. said.

“Then he hugged them, kissed their mouths and necks, rubbed his face against theirs, grabbed their breasts, touched their bare thighs and moved his hand toward their (genitals), grabbed their buttocks, exposed himself, and sometime even masturbated in front of the victims,” Rackauckas said.

“When the victims attempted to escape from the office, he cornered them to prevent them from leaving, pinned them against walls, or hugged them tightly and close enough for the victims to feel that Bustamante had an erection,” he said.

Six felony counts of false imprisonment, three of assault with the intent to commit a sexual offense, and one count each of stalking, attempted sexual battery by restraint, and grand theft by false pretense, and one misdemeanor count each of battery, assault, sexual battery, and attempted sexual battery with a sentencing enhancement allegation for committing the offenses as a result of sexual compulsion and for the purpose of sexual gratification, according to the D.A.

If convicted on all counts, Bustamante faces a maximum sentence of 26 years and two months in state prison, plus an additional year and nine months in county jail, and would be subject to lifetime sex offender registration. He is scheduled to be arraigned Thursday.

Rackauckas asked for the public’s help in continuing the investigation, saying he believed his office’s investigation “has just scratched the surface” and asking anyone with information to come forward.

“We are also interested in knowing who knew what, when they knew it and why Bustamante was able to get away with the abuse of the women who worked under him,” the D.A. said. “We want to know how a wolf was kept in charge of his prey for so long. How he was able to get away with a perverse abuse of position and power for the last eight years.”

Prosecutors accuse Bustamante of targeting a particular “type” of woman: Hispanic and “generally young ladies.” While most encounters with the women were limited to one or two occasions, in one instance, a woman reluctantly became involved in a sexual relationship with Bustamante for a period of time, Rackauckas said.

But when she told him it was over, Bustamante continued to go to her house and call her, which is where the stalking charge stems from, the D.A. said.

The fraud-related charge – grand theft by false pretense – stems from a 2010 trip Bustamante took to Boston for a Harvard School of Government program, where he agreed to personally pay more than $3,000 of the tuition, prosecutors said.

The trip, adding the tuition, meals, airfare, extra baggage, lodging and taxis, should have cost $12,791. The county was to pick up 75 percent of the tab but instead ended up paying 97 percent of the junket, the D.A. said.

In all, Bustamante is accused of fraudulently receiving a $3,100 reimbursement from the county, to which he was not entitled, the county’s chief prosecutor said.

“You may spin $3,100 as not a lot of money in a county with a budget over $5.6 billion,” Rackauckas said. “To put it into perspective, one in seven county employees makes $3,100 or less a month.”

Bustamante earned more than $170,000 a year at his county job.

“It’s hard to fathom why someone making a six-figure income would be tapping the county for these amounts … . This grand theft occurred during one of the toughest fiscal times in county history,” the D.A. said.

The issue of Bustamante’s absence from the Santa Ana City Council meeting Monday night came up twice – once when the council couldn’t muster a quorum to decide the future of its controversial downtown business improvement district, and once again during council comments at the end of the meeting, when Councilwoman Michele Martinez noted the arrest.

“It’s a private matter. It had to do with his outside employment. It has nothing to do with the city of Santa Ana,” Martinez said. “They are some serious allegations, but with that being said, we can’t comment on those. We’re not the district attorney. We’re the city of Santa Ana.”

Tom Lutz, a former Santa Ana councilman, said that he doesn’t think Bustamante should seek reelection to a third term this fall. Bustamante has served on the council since 2004.

“Having served on the council when Ted Moreno was indicted, I don’t think one can fully serve in a manner the public has entrusted to an elected official,” he said by email.

Moreno, also a former Santa Ana councilman, was sentenced in 2001 to nearly five years in prison for 25 counts of public corruption, including taking thousands of dollars in payoffs from an FBI informant.

“I’ve known Carlos since the early 90’s and have had the most respect for him over the years,” Lutz said, noting Bustamante’s military and law enforcement background. “This is all very shocking to me. In saying that, of course I knew him as flirt with the girls but thought that was just show and that’s where it ended. I’m sorry for his family and so surprised he would put himself and family in jeopardy if all the allegations are true.”

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